India’s Unclear Regulations Leave Blockchain And Crypto Startups In Dismay, Is There Still Hope?

The year 2019 hasn’t been so great for the Indian blockchain and crypto industry, seeing favorable regulations haven’t been circulated and central banks have had a hostile attitude.

At the beginning of the year, some crypto exchanges have shut down, not to mention there have been many layoffs.

However, now that global giant companies like Facebook are entering the crypto space and exploring the possibility of having digital currencies or working with the blockchain technology, also with the industry trying to regulate itself, experts are saying the Indian crypto startups may have many things to gain. This is what Binance’s CEO, Changpeng Zhao, has declared on the global crypto situation:

“Governments across the globe are now examining blockchain and cryptocurrencies, including stable coins, as well as self-regulated and global regulatory standards, which indicate more widespread public adoption. I think in 2020, we will see different experiments tried by many different governments around the globe for adoption. Some will work, some may not, but overall, they will have a tremendously positive effect for crypto adoption.”

Recently, Binance bought the Indian exchange WazirX in order to enter the market in the country.

Reserve Bank of India Against Private Digital Currencies

The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has, over the past week, expressed that it opposes private digital currencies. More than this, earlier this year, the former secretary for finance, Subhash Chandra Garg, has said trading of cryptocurrency should be made illegal in India.

However, RBI has started consulting with other central banks on the subject of releasing its own digital currency.

China Set to Release a Digital Currency by 2021

While China is preparing to release a digital currency by the year 2021, other countries like Malaysia, Singapore and France are also testing what a virtual currency could bring them. The founder of Policy 4.0, the regulatory and policy advisory company, Tanvi Ratna, said that China releasing a digital currency could have an influence on how India regulates crypto. This is what he declared:

“Too much has shifted in the global regulatory front, and that will already start impacting Indian startups, regardless of the Indian government’s decision. The blockchain world in 2020 is going to look a lot different from the last year or two.”

Indian Crypto Startups are Moving Offices

Many Indian crypto startups are looking to move their offices in countries that have friendlier cryptocurrency policies. In spite of having to deal with tough regulations, they’re still managing to innovate, said Varun Deshpande, the co-founder of the Neo bank Juno.

The CEO of the crypto company ZPX, Ramani Ramachandran, thinks more and more Indian firms are interested in trading in crypto and innovating the industry. He said,

“There are pronouncements of these kind (against private digital currencies) but on the ground level there are a bunch of companies coming up.”

While RBI and the Indian government are concerned when it comes to private digital currencies, they’re still interested in the subject, it’s the opinion of crypto exchange Unocoin’s CEO, Sathvik Vishwanath.

He thinks that unless global authorities aren’t banning the crypto trading, the Indian government won’t do it either.

Meanwhile, everyone in India is waiting on the Supreme Court to rule in an attempting case of RBI to ban banking channels, ruling that will say in which direction the crypto market in India is going.